Primary Source

Quaker schoolteacher Josiah Forster first published this broadside, Christian Discipline: Or Certain Good and Wholesome Orders for the Well-Governing of My Family, in 1751, thirty years after the death of its author, William Penn, the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania.

Primary Source

The Christian History was a revivalist periodical founded by the Boston clergyman Thomas Prince in 1743. As Prince traveled from church to church in New England to preach, he recorded the reactions of the various congregations in his periodical. This June 1744 issue of the journal comments on the evangelical spirit present in Connecticut.

Teaching Resource

While the dominant narrative of the American Revolution focuses on its political causes, the factor of religion cannot be ignored. Many settlers came to the North American colonies seeking the freedom to practice their religions. For the Puritans, who established a vision for their colony, calling it a “City upon a Hill,” religion was intertwined with America’s destiny to become a beacon for the world. One cannot fully understand the minds of the Revolutionary generation without considering the place of...

Teaching Resource

The most important religious development in colonial America was the introduction of religious revivals known as the Great Awakening. Religious revivals first appeared in England, Scotland, and Germany, and ultimately spread to the colonies. The fervor of these revivals represented a reaction against the formality of Congregational churches. A leading figure in the Great Awakening was the clergyman Jonathan Edwards, who attempted to reconcile Calvinism and the Enlightenment.

Significance

The...

Teaching Resource

This unit is part of Gilder Lehrman’s series of Common Core State Standards–based teaching resources. These units were written to enable students to understand, summarize, and analyze original texts of historical significance. Students will demonstrate this knowledge by...

Teaching Resource

The previous list of Essential Questionscan be downloaded as a pdf here.

A carefully crafted lesson has a well-defined focus and framework as well as a clearly stated purpose. The lesson should present students with an issue that is phrased as a problem to be solved or a thought-provoking question to be...

Teaching Resource

Puritans believed that reading the Bible was important to achieving salvation and, therefore, teaching children to read was a priority in their colonial centers. The New England Primer, first published in Boston in 1690 and used by students through the nineteenth century, was seen as a means to advance literacy. With more than five million copies of the Primer sold, generations of children first learned their ABCs through this publication. The document image is an excerpt from the Primer...